Logotype and icon for Mark Cross

Mark Cross is an American luxury leather goods company, founded in Boston in 1845 to produce bridles, saddles, and other equestrian products. The company later moved to New York and shifted its focus to gloves, luggage, and especially handbags—most famously Grace Kelly’s boxy handbag in Alfred Hitchcock’s Rear Window. After changing hands a few times, the company went dormant in the late 1990s before being relaunched in 2011. Creative director Povilas Utovka was brought in to refresh and revitalize the identity in 2023, and he in turn tapped us to help redevelop the logo system.

Our first step was a visit to Mark Cross’s office in New York, where we were able to browse through the company’s archive of both print materials and actual products. Aside from a strange Eurostile-like interlude in the 1970s, the primary Mark Cross logotype had stayed remarkably consistent throughout the company’s 179-year history. Certain hallmarks, like the reversed angle on the top of the R, were considered set in stone, though we did sketch it the other way, too, to make sure no option went unexplored. The secondary lettering is a flared, gently expanded sans serif based loosely on monograms on the company’s luggage. Greg Gazdowicz and Christian Schwartz worked together on the logotype, and Schwartz drew the secondary sans.

We commissioned illustrator Caroline Church, who primarily works in scraperboard, to update the heraldic lion, moving it off of the top of the logo lockup and allowing it to stand on its own, coequal to the logotype. Her thoroughly modern take on the classic motif does a masterful job of communicating the brand’s heritage.